Tree Branches and Hugs
by Ravenclaw'sWit015
Summary: Henry has a nightmare. Emma comforts him.


Tree Branches and Hugs

Summary: Henry has a nightmare. Emma comforts him.

**Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, but I do wish I could give them all giant hugs.**

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_He struggled against the tree branches holding him in the air. They tightened with every move he tried to make until he couldn't even so much as flinch. He looked up. He looked left, then right. He closed his eyes. Anything to keep from looking down. He opened his eyes again and cursed himself for looking down anyway. _

_There, on the forest floor below him laid the bodies of Emma, and Neal, and Charming, charred and burnt to a crisp. His mother stood over them, with her hand buried in Snow's chest. _

_NO! NO this couldn't be happening! Stop it, Mom, please, stop, he wanted to yell. But the words wouldn't come out. Had she taken his voice, too?_

_Henry watched in horror as his mother ripped her hand from his grandmother's chest. He wanted to scream in terror and anger and anguish as Snow fell to the ground in pain. He wanted to reach out and tear Grams' heart from Mom's hand and put it back in himself. But his arms wouldn't budge. He couldn't do anything but stare as Mom's fist closed around Grams' heart and listen as Grams' cries of pain were drowned out by Mom's vengeful, hateful cackling. _

_NOnonononononono! Please, no. _

_His vision was blurred by the tears streaming down his face, but he could still see Mom, turning toward him, the dust of Grams' heart still cupped in her hand. She was coming toward him now. Slowly. A sickly, sweet, demented smile on her face, a wild, eager look in her eyes. The familiar urge to run welled up in him again. He wanted to go, anywhere. Out of the forest, out of Storybrooke, far, far away where she couldn't follow him. But now there was nowhere, __**no one**__ for him to run to now. His family was gone._

_"Now don't worry darling," his head snapped up. Mom was right in front of him now. Her face inches from his. "This won't hurt at all. It'll be quick, and painless, and then everything will be like it was before." She stroked her hand along his face. He wanted to be sick._

_ "Just you and me, sweetheart," she soothed in a singsong voice. "No one to take you away from me ever again. No one else to come between us." She backed away, preparing to cast her curse. She brought the handful of dust up to her lips, and blew it into his face—_

"NO!" More branches were holding him now. "No! Lemme go! No! No!" The branches tightened. Henry fought. "No!"

"Henry! Henry, it's me. It's Emma. Wake up! Wake up! Please wake up!" Not cursed tree branches, _Emma_. He was home. He was in his room. In his bed, with Emma. He was safe.

"Oh…" he breathed, as he relaxed in her arms. Emma tightened her embrace. She peppered kisses along his brow and ran her fingers through his hair. He was still crying like he was in his dreams. And something else, too. His pajama pants were wet… "Oh, _no_," he moaned, humiliated. He and Emma shared a bed.

"That's okay," Emma reassured. "You're alright. We'll clean it up. Don't worry about it." Henry cried harder. His small frame shook with every sob. No, it wasn't all right. He wasn't sure if anything would ever be all right again. "Do you wanna talk about it?"

"You're alive."

"Yeah…"

"She killed you."

"Oh, Henry," Emma's arms tightened. It reminded Henry of the branches and he squirmed. Emma's grip loosened. _Arms, not branches_, he reminded himself. J_ust a dream_

"She k-killed all of you. And she m-made me watch." He struggled to get the words out between sobs. "C-c-couldn't do anything. She tied me up. She was g-go-gonna curse me. And I couldn't—"

"Shhhhh," Emma rocked him. "Shhh, Henry. No more now. You're not there. She's not here. You're with us. She's not gonna hurt you. I promise."

"She's using magic now."

"Uhm, hello. Super-Almighty-Savior-Made-Of-True-Love-Magical-Gi rl, here?" She pointed to her chest. Henry laughed. Or, he tried to.

"We don't know where she is. She might try again…"

"Well then we'll fight her. We're the good guys, remember? Good will always win, right?"

And that's the thing. His family _would_ fight his mother. Good would win. But did he want it to? Did he want his grandparents, and father, and birthmother to put an end to his mother for good? She was bad. He knew it. He knew what she was capable of.

_What she was capable of._ Yes, more than anyone, Henry knew what Regina could do. Evil, horrible, horrible evil like she'd done in the past, like she'd almost done today, like she'd done to him and his family in his nightmare.

But love, too. She could love. He'd known that, too. The sing-you-to-sleep, kiss-your-ouchies, stay-up-til-midnight-helping-you-with-your-third-g rade-science-fair-project, kind of love. Mom was capable of that, too. He thought that by getting her to her give up magic, she could be that mommy again. But it seemed like that was the one thing she was incapable of.

He loved her. He hated her. He _feared_ her. But he did not want her gone. He wanted her _away, _far, far away.

Emma stopped rocking him and it broke Henry from his musings. "Why don't you go take a shower while I change the sheets? Try not to wake up Snow and Charming." Yeah, Henry didn't want anyone else to know he'd wet himself.

"What's going on?" _Too late._ Charming stood at the foot of the steps. Henry brushed past him to get to the shower.

"Nothing." Emma turned to face her father. "Just a nightmare."

"Should I light a candle?"

"Nah, I think he's kind of embarrassed." She said, gesturing to the wet spot on the bed. "I don't think he wants us to make a big deal out of this."

"Ah, gotcha." He hesitated. "Did he say what the dream was about?"

"Regina. What else?" Charming nodded.

"Well let me know if you two need anything," he said, turning to head back downstairs.

Emma went to the linen closet to get more sheets. She tossed the dirty ones in a heap on the floor to deal with in the morning. Henry returned not long after she finished making the bed.

"Feel better," she asked.

Henry shook his head. He walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her. "I don't want to sleep anymore, Emma," he moaned. His shaking had returned. Emma's heart ached.

"Then we won't do that." _Tomorrow is going to be fun_. "What do you want to do, instead?"

"Can you tell me stories? About you and Dad? From back when you guys were together?" Even though Henry knew his dad was alive now, Emma was still pretty tight-lipped about their time together before she went to jail. He wondered why that was…

"Sure, kid," Emma sighed. She really didn't want to go down that road; she'd buried those memories for so long. But if it would take Henry's mind off recent events, then Emma would just have to suck it up. She motioned for Henry to lie back down under the covers. She crawled in beside him.

"Let's see," Emma began. She wrapped her arms around Henry, bringing him in close and resumed running her fingers through his hair.

"Did I ever tell you how your dad and I met? It's kind of a funny story…"

**A/N: I always found it weird how no one in the universe of the show ever thought about how Henry might have been affected by his mother attempting to cast a curse on him and kill his family. It's just a thing that happens and Henry supposedly just gets over it. Something's off about that. So here's me, speculating on Henry's Mommy Issues. **

**Please Review!**


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